The Adventures of Don Lavington Part 71

"Uncle Josiah used to say that people soon got tired of having holidays."

"Your Uncle Josiah soon got tired o' giving holidays, Mas' Don. I never, as you know, wanted many, but he always looked rat-traps at me if I asked for a day. Here you can have as many as you like."

"Well, let's take one to-day, Jem," said Don. "Fill another basket with something to eat, take a couple of bags, and we'll go right away into the forest, and bring back as much fruit as we can."

"I'll be all ready in no time," said Jem, cheerily; and at the end of three minutes he was equipped, and they started off together, to find Ngati half lying on the sands in company with about a dozen more of his tribe, all of whom gave the pair a friendly smile and a wondering look at the trouble they seemed to take to obtain fruit, when some of the women or girls could have done the task just as well.

"They are about the idlest set of chaps I ever did see, Mas' Don," said Jem, as they trudged cautiously along through the ferny woodlands, where traces of volcanic action were wonderfully plentiful.

"But they work when there's any need for it, I daresay," said Don. "See how vigorously they can row, and how energetic they are when they go through the war-dance."

"Oh! Any stoopid could jump about and make faces," replied Jem. "I wonder whether they really could fight if there was a row?"

"They look as if they could, Jem."

"Looks arn't much good in fighting, Mas' Don. Well, anyhow, they're big and strong enough. Look! What a pity we haven't got a gun. Might have shot a pig and had some pork."

He pointed to about half-a-dozen good-sized pigs, which had scurried across the path they followed, and then disappeared among the ferns.

"Rum thing, it always seems to me that there's nothing here except pigs.

There must be, farther in the woods. Mind that hole, my lad."

Don carefully avoided stepping into a bubbling patch of hot mud right in their path, and, wondering what would be the consequences of a step in, he went on, in and out, among dangerous water holes and mud springs.

c.o.c.katoos whistled overhead, and parrots shrieked, while every now and then they came upon a curious-looking bird, whose covering resembled hair more than feathers, as it c.o.c.ked its curved bill towards them, and then hurriedly disappeared by diving in amongst the dense low growth.

"Look at that!" said Jem. "Ostrich?"

"Ostrich!" cried Don contemptuously. "Why, an ostrich is eight feet high."

"Not when he's young," said Jem. "That's a little one. Shouldn't wonder if there's some more."

"You may be right, Jem, but I don't think there are ostriches here."

"Well, I like that," said Jem, "when we've just seen one. I knew it directly. There used to be a picture of one in my old reading-book when I was at school."

They trudged on for some distance in silence.

"What yer thinking 'bout, Mas' Don?"

"Home," said Don, quietly.

"Oh! I say, don't think about home, Mas' Don, because if you do, I shall too; it do make me so unked."

"I can't help it, Jem. It doesn't seem natural to settle down here, and go on week after week. I get asking myself, what we are doing it for."

"To catch fish, and find fruit and keep ourselves alive. Say, Mas' Don, it's under them trees they digs up the big lumps of gum that they burn.

Ah, there's a bit." Jem stooped and picked out from among the rotten pine needles a piece of pale yellowish-looking gum of the size of his fist.

"That'll do for a light for us," Don said. "Take it back."

"Going to," said Jem laconically. "We may want it 'fore long."

"Here's another bit," said Don, finding a similar sized piece, and thrusting it into the basket. "Couldn't we make some matches, Jem?"

"Couldn't we make some matches? Why, of course we could. There's plenty of brimstone, I'm going to try and manage a tinder-box after a time."

They again walked on in silence, climbing higher and higher, till, coming to an opening, they both paused in silent admiration of the view spread out before them, of river, lake, and mountain, whose top glistened like silver, where glacier and snow lay unmelted in spite of the summer heat.

"Wouldn't you like to go up there, Mas' Don?" said Jem, after a few moments' silence.

"Go? I'd give anything to climb up there, Jem. What a view it must be."

"Ah, it must, Mas' Don; but we won't try it to-day; and now, as we've been on the tramp a good two hours, I vote we sit down and have a bit of a peck."

Don agreed, and they sat down at the edge of the wood to partake of the rather scanty fare which they spread on the ground between them.

"Yes, it would be fine," said Jem, with his mouth and hands full. "We ought to go up that mountain some day. I've never been up a mountain.

Hi! Wos!"

This was shouted at another of the peculiar-looking little birds which ran swiftly out of the undergrowth, gave each in turn a comical look, and then seized a good-sized piece of their provender and ran off.

"Well, I call that sarce," said Jem; "that's what I calls that. Ah, if I'd had a stone I'd soon have made him drop that."

"Now," said Don laughing, "do you call that an ostrich?"

"To be sure I do!" cried Jem. "That proves it. I've read in a book as ostriches do steal and swallow anything--nails, pocket-knives, and bits o' stone. Well! I never did!"

Jem s.n.a.t.c.hed off his cap and sent it spinning after another rail which had run up and seized a fruit from their basket, and skimmed off with its legs forming a misty appearance like the spokes of a rapidly turning wheel.

"Sarce is nothing to it, Mas' Don. Why, that little beggar's ten times worse than the old magpie we used to have in the yard. They're so quick, too. Now, just look at that."

Either the same or another of the little birds came out of the undergrowth, peering about in the most eccentric manner, and without displaying the least alarm.

"Just look at him, Jem."

"Look at him, Mas' Don? I am a-looking at him with all my eyes. He's a beauty, he is. Why, if I was a bird like that with such a shabby, dingy looking, sooty suit o' clothes, I know what I'd do."

"What would you do?"

"Why, I'd moult at once. Look at the rum little beggar. Arn't he comic? Why, he arn't got no wings and no tail. Hi! c.o.c.ky, how did you get your beak bent that way? Look as if you'd had it caught in a gate.

Have another?"

Jem took up a large raspberry-like fruit that he had picked some time before, and held it out to the bird, which stopped short, and held its head down comically, looking first at Jem, and then at the berry. With a rapid twist it turned its head on the other side, and performed the same operation with the left eye.

"Well, he is a rum un!" cried Jem, laughing. "Look! Mas' Don, look!"

Don was watching the eccentric-looking little creature, which ran forward rapidly, and then paused.